Greenland biathlete pursues Olympic dream while anxious about 'terrifying' threats to her homeland

Ukaleq Slettemark is used to the stress of competing on the world stage as she tries to qualify for the Milan Cortina Winter Olympics. But the 25-year-old biathlete from Greenland is facing an extra level of anxiety as U.S. President Donald Trump keeps saying he wants to take over her country.

“It’s terrifying," Slettemark told The Associated Press on Wednesday from Ruhpolding, Germany, where she and her brother, Sondre, are competing in the biathlon World Cup. “We are imagining the worst-case scenario and my aunt is having trouble sleeping at night. My mom, yesterday, she broke down at the stadium crying because she’s so afraid.”

The Slettemark siblings compete for Greenland in the World Cup, but if they qualify for the Olympics — they will find out next week — they will represent Denmark, because Greenland is not a sovereign nation with its own national Olympic committee.

While stressing that she is an athlete, not politician, Slettemark said the threats from the U.S. are impossible to ignore. It's taking an extra effort to focus on training and competitions as she worries about what's happening back at home.

“People are talking about maybe they have to leave Greenland because they feel it’s so unsafe,” she said. "So we are terrified and we are really angry because this is not how you talk to another country, this is not how you talk to your allies. And we feel so disrespected and very scared.”

Trump reiterated his intention to take over Greenland on Wednesday, saying on social media that the U.S. “needs Greenland for the purpose of National Security.” His post came ahead of a meeting between Vice President JD Vance and Secretary of State Marco Rubio and Danish Foreign Minister Lars Løkke Rasmussen and his Greenlandic counterpart Vivian Motzfeldt.

Greenland is a semiautonomous territory of Denmark, a NATO ally.

Slettemark, who competed for Denmark in the 2022 Winter Olympics, was born in Nuuk, Greenland's capital. Both her parents are biathletes: her father, Øystein Slettemark, competed in the 2010 Winter Olympics in biathlon and her mother, Uiloq, founded the Greenland Biathlon Federation. The sport combines cross-country skiing with rifle shooting.

The U.S. threats follow her every day as other athletes ask how she is holding up. Slettemark said she has no hard feelings against the members of the U.S. team.

“I’m very good friends with the U.S. athletes," she said. “I think they’re all really nice people.”

Slettemark said she hopes Americans will pressure Congress to put a stop to the Greenland takeover plan, which she likened to Russian President Vladimir Putin's aggression in Ukraine.

Russia was banned from competing in the Olympics after the 2022 invasion of Ukraine — and Slettemark said she's overheard people on the biathlon circuit say the same should happen to the U.S. if it forcefully took over Greenland.

“I've definitely thought so myself, but we’re not at that stage right now, because nothing has happened yet,” she said. “But if it were to happen, then I would also agree that that would be the right way to do it.”

AP Winter Olympics: https://apnews.com/hub/milan-cortina-2026-winter-olympics

FILE - Ukaleq Astri Slettemark, of Greenland, competes in the Women 15 km Individual event at the Biathlon World Championships in Oberhof, Germany, Feb. 15, 2023. (AP Photo/Matthias Schrader, File)

FILE - Ukaleq Astri Slettemark of Denmark skis during the women's 7.5-kilometer sprint competition at the 2022 Winter Olympics, Feb. 11, 2022, in Zhangjiakou, China. (AP Photo/Kirsty Wigglesworth, File)

WASHINGTON (AP) — President Donald Trump has privately discussed the possibility of firing Attorney General Pam Bondi and replacing her with Environmental Protection Agency Administrator Lee Zeldin, three people familiar with the matter told The Associated Press on Thursday.

In those conversations, Trump has discussed his ongoing frustration with Bondi over her handing of the Jeffrey Epstein files and hurdles the Justice Department has encountered in investigations into Trump’s perceived enemies, the people said. The Republican president has mentioned other candidates but has raised Zeldin’s name as recently as this week, the people said.

The people were not authorized to publicly discuss the private conversations and spoke to the AP on the condition of anonymity.

No decision has been announced, and Trump has been known to change his mind on personnel decisions.

"Attorney General Pam Bondi is a wonderful person and she is doing a good job,” Trump said in a statement produced by the White House.

Zeldin, a former Republican congressman from New York, has been publicly and privately praised by Trump, who at an event in February described him as “our secret weapon.”

Bondi, a former state attorney general in Florida and a Trump loyalist who was part of his legal team during his first impeachment case, has been in her position for more than a year. She came into office pledging that she would not play politics with the Justice Department, but she quickly started investigations of Trump foes, sparking an outcry that the law enforcement agency was being wielded as a tool of revenge to advance the president’s political and personal agenda.

She has also endured months of scrutiny over the Justice Department’s handling of the Epstein files that made her the target of angry conservatives even with her close relationship with Trump.

Under Bondi’s leadership, the department opened investigations into a string of Trump foes, including Federal Reserve Chair Jerome Powell, New York Attorney General Letitia James, former FBI Director James Comey and former CIA Director John Brennan.

The high-profile prosecutions of Comey and James were quickly thrown out by a judge who ruled that the prosecutor who brought the cases was illegally appointed. Other politically charged investigations have either been rejected by grand juries or failed to result in criminal charges.

Attorney General Pam Bondi listens during a Cabinet meeting at the White House, Thursday, March 26, 2026, in Washington. (AP Photo/Alex Brandon)

President Donald Trump walks from the Blue Room to speak about the Iran war from the Cross Hall of the White House on Wednesday, April 1, 2026, in Washington. (AP Photo/Alex Brandon, Pool)